52 Pick-Up #4 – Yellow Submarine (1968)

Once, upon a post...
Or maybe twice.

Welcome back for another draw of 52 Pick-Up. Already one month down and so far, it's been an interesting journey. From cautionary tales of the dangers of authoritarianism, to fever dreams of demonic furniture, to a murder mystery abroad. With January going to a close, where do we go from here?

For starters, as I said last time, we're still tooling around Europe (and will be for just a little bit longer next month), but also we're closing out this month with a title that has been on my 'to do' list for a long time. In fact, of the first four, this has arguably been on here the longest.

It's the movie my wife was surprised to learn I hadn't seen until just this month, it's the animated classic Yellow Submarine.

I should start by saying, I wasn't avoiding this movie. It's one I'd had a general interest in for some time both for its own sake as a movie and just as one of the more colorful creations born out of the Beatles' legacy. Mostly it was just never quite lining up the right pieces of time, access, and opportunity.

As John himself once said it best 'life is what happens when you're busy making other plans.'

Okay, that's a bit of a reach to justify the fact this took me this long, but humor me.

Having now seen this movie? I have two immediate thoughts. The first – this was an incredibly fun experience and one I was pleased to see did not falter under its own reputation.

The second is a call back to the fact my wife was surprised I hadn't seen this (and something I am posting here with her blessing.) In mentioning this was on my to do list, she had mentioned first seeing this when being shown it by a music teacher she had growing up. Said teacher, she added, was very likely at some point in their life a hippie.

On having watched the movie for myself, I immediately sent her the below image with regards to that assessment:

Again, this is not a criticism. I really enjoyed this one.

First, let's get into the customary 'What is this about?' part.

Before I get into the pitch for this movie, I just want to say this – if you're watching Yellow Submarine for the plot, I don't want to say you're watching it wrong, but I am seriously questioning your priorities on this one. The story, such as it is, involves Pepperland, a fantastical fairy tale realm of love, peace, and music under the sea, where the people are all living in harmony. At least, for the first few minutes – enter the Blue Meanies, an outlandish band of villains whose hatred of music is matched only by their desire to stomp out joy (as their boss loudly declares early on “We Meanies only take NO for an answer!” if that gives an idea how committed they are.) The Meanies invade Pepperland, plummeting it into a sadness and disarray in short order. In the chaos, one of the residents, Young Fred, escapes in the titular Yellow Submarine to get help. His journey leads him to Liverpool where he crosses paths with the Beatles (not voiced by themselves, though they appear at the very end) who agree to help him save his homeland. What follows is a free-wheeling, outlandish journey through space, time, and a respectable slice of Beatles discography.

Hmmm...can I still make the 'It's not the real Beatles,
but it is an incredible simulation' joke if the actual Beatles
do still make an appearance at the end of the movie?

Again, don't try to think too hard about the plot unless you want to give yourself a bad time. Just enjoy the ride, because while it's not deeply or tightly plotted, it has a lot to recommend in it.

Up high on the list of things to recommend this for? The animation. I had known about the look of this movie from stills for years, but finally seeing this all in motion, I was pleasantly surprised by how good this looks in general, both in terms of its motion and just the uniquely strange visual styles it plays around with. In fact, this just placed pretty high on the movies I'll be looking for repertory screenings on, because I'd love to see this one in a theater to further just soak it all in.

Of course, this isn't all just music and fun visuals – though that is a lot of it. For as much as I was saying not to expect a deep or involving story, what story there is here is helps keep everything moving, it's breezy, it's funny, and it just keeps you interested and moving in equal parts to keep you from getting too bogged down in 'how did that work?' types of questions. The humor, especially, was one I didn't see coming. I expected this to just be a fun, delightful ride, but I was also pleasantly surprised at the number of times this movie got honest to God laughs out of me – be it with the over the top antics of the Meanies or the often deadpan comedic deliveries of the Beatles themselves. The two make a fun contrast, with the villains played at a constant 11 while the dialed back performances of our heroes read as less 'cool' and more comically oblivious to the situation they've been thrust into and just going with the flow.

Speaking of over-the-top villainy, special shout-out to actor
Paul Angelis, whose performance as the Chief Blue Meanie
is easily the acting MVP of the film. Just pure concentrated
mustache-twirling lunacy, and one was not surprised to learn
Mark Hamill got some inspiration from for his Joker performance.

Okay, score one for chance on this entry. Yes, the year started off on a good, but downright bleak note. As we come to the end of the first month and the temperatures get colder, this made for a welcome light note to close out on and one I'm now glad to have taken off the list.

For a starting four, this is giving me a general good feeling about the year ahead.

Speaking of which, next time something goes live here, it will be a new month, and with it, some new tweaks to the way these are chosen. I'll explain more next time as our informal tour of Europe continues for just a bit longer, though we're finally shifting to a different period in time. So, see you all in February when this project stops in Ireland for the 2024 horror movie Oddity.

Until then.

52 Pick-Up #1 – The Damned (1969)

Hello and welcome back for the first entry in this year's attempt to get myself writing at a regular pace again – a dive through my cinematic 'To Do' list I have taken to christening 52 Pick Up.

As I said last time, we're kicking this project off with a title I've been circling for a bit now and one I hope hasn't just doomed this year from a tonal standpoint – Luchino Visconti's grim Nazi-era cautionary tale, The Damned.

Gonna be honest with you all - normally, I'd be trying to do cheeky
captions with the screencaps. For this one? I don't think I can
really riff this in good conscience. Maybe next time.

This is a title that has been on the list for a couple of years now. There are some here that will have been in place longer, but, as I said before, these are chosen at random. This crossed my cinematic radar a few years back when it was announced as an addition to the Criterion Collection. The premise had potential to spike my curiosity, but also reading up left me debating if I wanted to make this a Criterion blind buy or not.

Having drawn this first, let me take this moment to remind you – to the aspiring cinephile on a budget, a good library system is a reliable accomplice.

Now that I've watched the film, I'll start by saying, it's a very good movie and I'm glad I watched it. I'm not sure I'm gonna be running out to own it, but damn, I'm gonna be thinking of this one for a while.

For anyone not familiar with the movie, I'll keep the pitch brief. Set in Weimar Germany, we are introduced to the wealthy Essenbeck family (loosely inspired by the real life Krupps), a line of old nobility with a prominent steelworks to their name. They have all gathered for the birthday celebration of their wealthy patriarch – an innocent enough event that, by chance, happens to coincide with the Reichstag fire. Suddenly, the Essenbecks find themselves at a crossroads – power is shifting in Germany, and the fate of the family may depend on where it settles. Individual members waste no time drawing lines for their parts of the estate and casting their lots in with whichever faction they think will come out on top, and for many, benefit them personally.

As you can probably already guess, this does not end well for...anyone, really. One by one, the members of the family are either betrayed, corrupted, or sometimes both, as their legacy is rolled up and ground into the Nazi war machine.

So if you're looking for something bright and optimistic to start the new year with, maybe table this one for a later date, though I would still say to seek it out if you think you're up for it.

(Spoiler heads-up here, feel free to highlight and read or ignore, but again, if you're not sure, this may be a deal breaker: besides the obvious themes of Nazism, another risky point in this may come in the character of Martin, a hedonistic member of the Essenbecks who is brought under the thumb of the Reich as a result of his predilection for young girls. This thankfully isn't presented in a particularly graphic fashion, but the movie still makes it clear he's a predator. Something to keep in mind, cause I know that can be a lot to get blindsided by.)

As I write this, it's been a few days since I finished the movie and, like I said, I've had it rolling around in my head. In particular, the theme of complicity and how it's presented across many members of the family and to what ends.

Okay, more spoilers ahead, less for 'this content may be a bit much' and more 'I can't really discuss this point without addressing what it leads to.'

There's no question where Visconti comes down on the topic based on what's presented – like I said at the start, this whole film is a cautionary tale on the dangers of complicity and how, in the face of such authoritarian movements, there is no such thing as a 'safe' place. Even those who willingly cast in their lots with it aren't guaranteed protection. To the point where I think the first thought I had on finishing was you could put this in a killer double feature alongside Cabaret or Mephisto (or make a triple play to really get an audience in a grim state of mind.)

It's also something it's hard not to think about nowadays in light of – well, everything going on.

Yes, this one's gonna get a little political, folks. It's kind of hard not to with a movie like this. It's fine if you'd rather come back next time, I promise, it will be a much lighter title.

I didn't go into this one looking to explicitly draw the connections, but it's hard not to as one sees how the movie unfolds. Every member of the family has their way of trying to address the situation – be it the staunch anti-Nazi Herbert who attempts to flee the country, the brash partisan Konstantin who believes the SA will come out on top and intends to put his part of the family's trust in them, or the calculating Friedrich, a relative outsider in the family who allies himself with the Nazis to try and secure his hold in the family and company. Each of these characters responds to the growing threat in their own way, either by convincing themselves it will blow over or that they can manipulate it to their own gain.

One by one, they find themselves either outmaneuvered (Herbert), having chosen the wrong side (Konstantin), or ultimately undone when they discovered the party didn't feel they were sufficiently loyal (Friedrich). When the dust settles, the only family members left standing are the ones who have effectively cast aside their identities as members of the Essenbeck family and instead become uniformed officers of the Nazi party, with their steelworks now dedicated to the war machine.

All the while, only one member of the family even remotely seems to realize the danger they're in – and because of that, Herbert is absent for much of the movie, only returning in the third act under duress and knowing he will be arrested and executed for doing so. The others, one by one, continue to try and play their games of power, never realizing just how perilous their positions truly are.

Actually, there is one other besides Herbert who has any sort of inkling of the situation – that would be Aschenbach, a cousin of the family who starts the movie already a uniformed member of the party. With loyalties already firmly with the Reich over blood, he is quick to advise and manipulate his kin towards activities that will either weaken their holds over the family's steelworks or strengthen the party's hold over the family member in question.

Even more striking is, Aschenbach never actively tries to hide what he's doing – there are several moments where he talks with family members about things like the growing complicity of the German people (“Every German is a potential informant” he declares at one point) and openly tells one member of the family that the powerful people the Nazis desire are those who understand how quickly that power can be taken away from them if they fail to toe the line.

Of course, this is the tragedy of both the story and history itself – even as it becomes clearer the way the winds are blowing, the Essenbecks assume it won't effect them – that either they will overcome it or at least it will blow past. A refrain that echoes painfully clearly in history to this day, as so many tragedies get foreshadowed by 'well it won't happen to me' or 'that won't happen this time.'

In wrapping this up, I find myself thinking about the visual bookends of the movie – its opening titles unfold over shots of a steelworks, specifically in full view of the heat and smoke (and an opening title scored effectively by Maurice Jarre.) This is one of only two times we actually see the company, though it is spoken of often. The only other time comes after the family has been effectively gutted and subsumed by the Nazis, cutting from a final shot of newly appointed patriarch Martin (clad in black uniform and armband), back to the fire and smoke of the steelworks. Besides the obvious Hellish imagery that would suggest, it drives the final point home for the message that the movie is conveying – the family was never of any value to the Nazis, only the steel they could provide. In the end, the people have been eradicated or repurposed, all that remains is the resources.

It's a grim note, but also one it's hard not to ponder at a time where more and more people are questioning how to react to increasingly more alarming grabs for power – will they acknowledge and try to stop it, try to mitigate it, or pretend it's not a concern until it comes for them personally, if they even acknowledge it then? It's not an easy question, and frankly, I feel like no one can truly give a definite clear answer until they're in the moment – but it's hard not to find myself wondering at my own choices watching others play out theirs in a narrative like this.

...well, that was a cheery note to kick this year off. Once again, I hope this being shuffled first wasn't foreshadowing.

As I said before, we'll be going somewhere lighter next week, if not also a little stranger. It's a movie that has been on my to do list since first learning of it as many did in the punchline of a stand-up comic.

Feel free to come back next week for the 1977 weirdo cult favorite Death Bed: The Bed That Eats.

Until then.